Billboards are utilized to impart advertising information to passengers, drivers and pedestrians within view of the billboard. A typical billboard is a large outdoor advertising structure usually found in high traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertisements to passing pedestrians and drivers. Typically showing large, ostensibly witty slogans, and distinctive visuals, billboards are highly visible in the top designated market areas. Bulletins are the largest, most impactful standard-size billboards. Located primarily on major highways, expressways or principal arterials, they command high-density consumer exposure (mostly to vehicular traffic). Bulletins afford greatest visibility due not only to their size, but because they allow creative “customizing” through extensions and embellishments. Billboards are an ideal place to advertise business because rather than you having to find your customers, your customers will find your advertising
Posters represent another common form of billboard advertising, located chiefly in commercial and industrial areas on primary and secondary arterial roads. Posters are a smaller format than bulletins and are viewed principally by residents and commuter traffic, with some pedestrian exposure. Yet smaller outdoor advertising displays are Kiosks, prevalent at buss stops, train stations, on and in busses, in subways, along busy walkways etc.
Most billboards and similar advertising media are static. Recently, however, the advertising industry has moved toward electronic billboards and similar digital displays, which are capable of imparting a wide variety of different types of advertisements in a single digital display over a shorter period of time.
Electronic billboards and electronic signs are most common in major cities such as Las Vegas, New York and Tokyo, where large-format electronic signs deliver advertising via static, periodic posting and dynamic video content to passers-by. Although the display technologies may vary widely, electronic signs and billboards all require some type of content source to generate the images on the display. Depending on regulatory and technical considerations, this content can be a series of static slides (periodic postings), or a sequence of broadcast-quality video and animation.
One of the problems with such advertising media is the poor ability to track how often the advertisements actually reach an intended target or make an “impression” on passing drivers, pedestrians, passengers, and so forth. Current approaches to this problem do not readily enable tracking mobile viewers of billboard advertising, especially those in a vehicle (e.g., automobile, trucks, trains, etc).